What is Pelican (pelican.dev)?

Pelican is a free, open-source game server control panel that runs each game server inside its own Docker container. It's aimed at anyone who wants to manage game servers through a web interface rather than by hand — from a small group of friends to a larger gaming community. If you're comfortable running a machine (or renting one) and want a panel that handles installation, isolation, and updates for you, Pelican is built for that job.

What Pelican actually does

At its core, Pelican gives you a single interface to create, configure, and manage game servers. Instead of installing each game manually and juggling ports, config files, and process management yourself, you work through the panel.

The site describes it as "the ultimate, free game server control panel offering high flying security," with a "sleek and user-friendly interface." The practical pieces:

• One-click installations — deploy supported games without a manual setup process.
• Docker-based isolation — every server runs in its own container, so one server's problems don't spill into another.
• Automatic updates — the panel and its components can update themselves.
• Comprehensive documentation and active community support — help is available when something breaks.

Which games are supported

Pelican uses "eggs" — packaged configurations that tell the panel how to install and run a specific game. The site lists these as supported, among others:

The list is explicitly open-ended ("and so much more"), so if your game isn't named here, it's worth checking the eggs repository before assuming it's unsupported.

Why Docker matters here

Each server runs in its own container and is "completely isolated." Two consequences follow from that:

1. You can run Pelican on almost any machine. Because games don't install into your host system directly, you're not locked to a specific OS setup the way a bare-metal install might require.
2. Servers don't interfere with each other. A misconfigured mod, a crashing process, or a dependency conflict stays inside its container.

This is the main architectural reason Pelican can be described as scalable — the same approach works whether you're hosting one server for friends or many for a community.

Security features

The site states Pelican "takes security extremely seriously" and natively supports:

• SSL
• Two-factor authentication (2FA)
• AES-256 encryption

These are the panel-level protections. Container isolation from Docker is a separate layer on top.

Cost and licensing

Pelican is described as 100% free to use forever — for yourself, friends, family, and others. All of its code is completely open source on GitHub. That means you can inspect it, self-host it, and aren't tied to a paid tier for the features described above.

Note that "free panel" doesn't mean "free hosting" — you still need a machine to run it on, whether that's your own hardware or a rented server.

Is Pelican a good fit for you?

It likely fits if you:

• Want to host one or more game servers without managing each one manually.
• Value container isolation and don't want games touching your host system.
• Prefer open-source software you can self-host and audit.
• Are running a community and expect to add more servers over time.

It may not fit if you:

• Want a fully managed hosting service where someone else handles the hardware and network.
• Only need a single server and would rather use the game's own official tooling.
• Aren't able to run or rent a machine to host the panel on.

The fastest way to judge it is to check the eggs list for the specific games you care about, then review the documentation for the install requirements of your target machine.